Nomads of Gor coc-4 Page 5

  The crowd had opened a passage for the woman and the girl saw the clothing cast on the open fire.

  “No, no!” she screamed. “No!”

  Then she tried once more to free herself.

  “Tell her,” said Kamchak, “that she must learn Gorean quickly — that she will be slain if she does not.”

  I translated this for the girl.

  She shook her head wildly. “Tell them my name is Elizabeth Cardwell,” she said. “I don’t know where I am — or how I got here — I want to get back to America — I’m an American citizen — my home is in New York City — take me back there — I will pay you anything!”

  “Tell her,” repeated Kamchak, “that she must learn Gorean quickly — and that if she does not she will be slain.”

  I translated this once more for the girl.

  “I will pay you anything,” she pleaded. “Anything!”

  “You have nothing,” I informed her, and she blushed. “Further,” I said, “we do not have the means of returning you to your home.”

  “Why not?” she demanded.

  “Have you not,” I pressed, “noted the difference in the gravitational field of this place — have you not noted the slight difference in the appearance of the sun?”

  “It’s not true!” she screamed.

  “This is not Earth,” I told her. “This is Gor — another earth perhaps — but not yours.” I looked at her fixedly. She must understand. “You are on another planet.”

  She closed her eyes and moaned.

  “I know,” she said. “I know — I know — but how — how — how?”

  “I do not know the answer to your question,” I said. I did not tell her that I was, incidentally, keenly interested — for my own reasons — in learning the answer to her question.

  Kamchak seemed impatient.

  “What does she say?” he asked.

  “She is naturally disturbed,” I said. “She wishes to return to her city.”

  “What is her city?” asked Kamchak.

  “It is called New York,” I said.

  “I have never heard of it,” said Kamchak.

  “It is far away,” I said.

  “How is it that you speak her language?” he asked.

  “I once lived in lands where her language is spoken,” I said.

  “Is there grass for the bosk in her lands?” asked Kamchak.

  “Yes,” I said, “but they are far away.”

  “Farther even than Thentis?” asked Kamchak.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Farther even than the islands of Cos and-Tyros?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  Kamchak whistled. “That is far,” he said.

  I smiled. “It is too far to take the bosk,” I said.

  Kamchak grinned at me.

  One of the warriors on the kaiila spoke. “She was with no one,” he said. “We searched. She was with no one.”

  Kamchak nodded at me, and then at the girl.

  “Were you alone?” I asked.

  The girl nodded weakly.

  “She says she was alone,” I told Kamchak.

  “How came she here?” asked Kamchak.

  I translated his question, and the girl looked at me, and then closed her eyes and shook her head. “I don’t know,” she said.

  “She says she does not know,” I told Kamchak.

  “It is strange,” said Kamchak. “But we will question her further later.”

  He signalled to a boy who carried a skin of Ka-la-na wine over his shoulder. He took the skin of wine from the boy and bit out the horn plug; he then, with the wineskin on his shoulder, held back the head of Elizabeth Cardwell with one hand and with the other shoved the bone nozzle of the skin between her teeth; he tipped the skin and the girl, half choking, swallowed wine; some of the red fluid ran from her mouth and over her body.

  When Kamchak thought she had drunk enough he pulled the nozzle from her mouth, pushed back the plug and returned the skin to the boy.

  Dazed, exhausted, covered with sweat, dust on her face and legs, wine on her body, Elizabeth Cardwell, her wrists thonged behind her and her throat bound to a lance, stood captive before Kamchak of the Tuchuks.

  He must be merciful. He must be kind.

  “She must learn Gorean,” said Kamchak to me. “Teach her ‘La Kajira’.”

  “You must learn Gorean,” I told the girl.

  She tried to protest, but I would not permit it.

  “Say ‘La Kajira’,” I told her.

  She looked at me, helplessly. Then she repeated, “La Kajira.”

  “Again,” I commanded.

  “La Kajira,” said the girl clearly, “La Kajira.”

  Elizabeth Cardwell had learned her first Gorean.

  “What does it mean?” she asked.

  “It means,” I told her, “I am a slave girl.”

  “No!” she screamed. “No, no, no!”

  Kamchak nodded to the two riders mounted on kaiila. “Take her to the wagon of Kutaituchik.”

  The two riders turned their kaiila and in a moment, moving rapidly, the girl running between them, had turned from the grassy lane and disappeared between the wagons.

  Kamchak and I regarded one another.

  “Did you note the collar she wore?” I asked.

  He had not seemed to show much interest in the high, thick leather collar that the girl had had sewn about her neck.

  “Of course,” he said.

  “I myself,” I said, “have never seen such a collar.”

  “It is a message collar,” said Kamchak. “Inside the leather, sewn within, will be a message.”

  My look of amazement must have amused him, for he laughed. “Come,” he said, “let us go to the wagon of Kutaituchik.”

  Chapter 7

  LA KAJIRA

  The wagon of Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the Tuchuks, was drawn up on a large, flat-topped grassy hill, the highest land in the camp.

  Beside the wagon, on a great pole fixed in the earth, stood the Tuchuk standard of the four bosk horns.

  The hundred, rather than eight, bosk that drew his wagon had been unyoked; they were huge, red bosk; their horns had been polished and their coats glistened from the comb and oils; their golden nose rings were set with jewels; necklaces of precious stones hung from the polished horns.

  The wagon itself was the largest in the camp, and the largest wagon I had conceived possible; actually it was a vast platform, set on numerous wheeled frames; though at the edges of the platform, on each side, there were a dozen of the large wheels such as are found on the much smaller wagons; these latter wheels turned as the wagon moved and supported weight, but could not of themselves have supported the entire weight of that fantastic, wheeled palace of hide.

  The hides that formed the dome were of a thousand colours, and the smoke hole at the top must have stood more than a hundred feet from the flooring of that vast platform. I could well conjecture the riches, the loot and the furnishing that would dazzle the interior of such a magnificent dwelling.

  But I did not enter the wagon, for Kutaituchik held his court outside the wagon, in the open air, on the flat-topped grassy hill. A large dais had been built, vast and spreading, but standing no more than a foot from the earth. This dais was covered with dozens of thick rugs, sometimes four and five deep.

  There were many Tuchuks, and some others, crowded about the dais, and, standing upon it, about Kutaituchik, there were several men who, from their position on the dais and their trappings, I judged to be of great importance.

  Among these men, sitting cross-legged, was Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the Tuchuks.

  About Kutaituchik there were piled various goods, mostly vessels of precious metal and strings and piles of jewels; there was silk there from Tyros; silver from Thentis and Tharna; tapestries from the mills of Ar; wines from Cos; dates from the city of Tor. There were also, among the other goods, two girls, blonde and blue-eyed, unclothed, chained; they had perhaps be
en a gift to Kutaituchik; or had been the daughters of enemies; they might have been from any city; both were beautiful; one was sitting with her knees tucked under her chin, her hands clasping her ankles, absently staring at the jewels about her feet; the other lay indolently on her side, incuriously regarding us, her weight on one elbow; there was a yellow stain about her mouth where she had been fed some fruit; both girls wore the Sirik, a light chain favoured for female slaves by many Gorean masters; it consists of a Turian-type collar, a loose, rounded circle of steel, to which a light, gleaming chain is attached; should the girl stand, the chain, dangling from her collar, falls to the floor; it is about ten or twelve inches longer than is required to reach from her collar to her ankles; to this chain, at the natural fall of her wrists, is attached a pair of slave bracelets; at the end of the chain there is attached another device, a set of linked ankle rings, which, when closed about her ankles, lifts a portion of the slack chain from the floor; the Sirik is an incredibly graceful thing and designed to enhance the beauty of its wearer; perhaps it should only be added that the slave bracelets and the ankle rings may be removed from the chain and used separately; this also, of course, permits the Sirik to function as a slave leash.

  At the edge of the dais Kamchak and I had stopped, where our sandals were removed and our feet washed by Turian slaves, men in the Kes, who might once have been officers of the city.

  We mounted the dais and approached the seemingly somnolent figure seated upon it.

  Although the dais was resplendent, and the rugs upon it even more resplendent, I saw that beneath Kutaituchik, over these rugs, had been spread a simple, worn, tattered robe of grey boskhide. It was upon this simple robe that he sat. It was undoubtedly that of which Kamchak had spoken, the robe upon which sits the Ubar of the Tuchuks, that simple robe which is his throne.

  Kutaituchik lifted his head and regarded us; his eyes seemed sleepy; he was bald, save for a black knot of hair that emerged from the back of his shaven skull; he was a broad-backed man, with small legs; his eyes bore the epicanthic fold; his skin was a tinged, yellowish brown; though he was stripped to the waist, there was about his shoulders a rich, ornamented robe of the red bosk, bordered with jewels; about his neck, on a chain decorated with sleen teeth, there hung a golden medallion, bearing the sign of the four bosk horns; he wore furred boots, wide leather trousers, and a red sash, in which was thrust a quiva. Beside him, coiled, perhaps as a symbol of power, lay a bosk whip. Kutaituchik absently reached into a small golden box near his right knee and drew out a string of rolled kanda leaf.

  The roots of the kanda plant, which grows largely in desert regions on Gor, are extremely toxic, but, surprisingly, the rolled leaves of this plant, which are relatively innocuous, are formed into strings and, chewed or sucked, are much favoured by many Goreans, particularly in the southern hemisphere, where the leaf is more abundant.

  Kutaituchik, not taking his eyes off us, thrust one end of the green kanda string in the left side of his mouth and, very slowly, began to chew it. He said nothing, nor did Kamchak. We simply sat near him, cross-legged. I was conscious that only we three on that dais were sitting. I was pleased that there were no prostrations or grovellings involved in approaching the august presence of the exalted Kutaituchik. I gathered that once, in his earlier years, he might have been a rider of the kaiila, that he might have been skilled with the bow and lance, and the quiva; such a man would not need ceremony; I sensed that once this man might have ridden six hundred pasangs in a day, living on a mouthful of water and a handful of bosk meat kept soft and warm between his saddle and the back of the kaiila; that there might have been few as swift with the quiva, as delicate with the lance, as he; that he had known the wars and the winters of the prairie; that he had met animals and men, as enemies, and had lived; such a man did not need ceremony; such a man, I sensed, was Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the Tuchuks.

  And yet was I sad as I looked upon him, for I sensed that for this man there could no longer be the saddle of the kaiila, the whirling of the rope and bola, the hunt and the war. Now, from the right side of his mouth, thin, black and wet, there emerged the chewed string of kanda, a quarter of an inch at a time, slowly. The drooping eyes, glazed, regarded us. For him there could no longer be the swift races across the frozen prairie; the meetings in arms; even the dancing to the sky about a fire of bosk dung.

  Kamchak and I waited until the string had been chewed.

  When Kamchak had finished he held out his right hand and a man, not a Tuchuk, who wore the green robes of the Caste of Physicians, thrust in his hand a goblet of bosk horn; it contained some yellow fluid. Angrily, not concealing his distaste, Kutaituchik drained the goblet and then hurled it from him.

  He then shook himself and regarded Kamchak.

  He grinned a Tuchuk grin. “How are the bosk?” he asked.

  “As well as may be expected,” said Kamchak.

  “Are the quivas sharp?”

  “One tries to keep them so,” said Kamchak.

  “It is important to keep the axles of the wagons greased,” observed Kutaituchik.

  “Yes,” said Kamchak, “I believe so.”

  Kutaituchik suddenly reached out and he and Kamchak, laughing, clasped hands.

  Then Kutaituchik sat back and clapped his hands together sharply twice. “Bring the she-slave,” he said.

  I turned to see a stout man-at-arms step to the dais, carrying in his arms, folded in the furs of the scarlet larl, a girl.

  I heard the small sound of a chain.

  The man-at-arms placed Elizabeth Cardwell before us, and Kutaituchik, and drew away the pelt of the scarlet larl.

  Elizabeth Cardwell had been cleaned and her hair combed. She was slim, lovely.

  The man-at-arms arranged her before us.

  The thick leather collar, I noted, was still sewn about her throat.

  Elizabeth Cardwell, though she did not know it, knelt before us in the position of the Pleasure Slave.

  She looked wildly about her and then dropped her head. Aside from the collar on her throat she, like the other girls on the platform, wore only the Sirik.

  Kamchak gestured to me.

  “Speak,” I said to her.

  She lifted her head and then said, almost inaudibly, trembling in the restraint of the Sirik. “La Kajira” Then she dropped her head.

  Kutaituchik seemed satisfied.

  “It is the only Gorean she knows,” Kamchak informed him.

  “For the time,” said Kutaituchik, “it is enough.” He then looked at the man-at-arms. “Have you fed her?” he asked.

  The man nodded.

  “Good,” said Kutaituchik, “the she-slave will need her strength.”

  The interrogation of Elizabeth Cardwell took hours. Needless to say, I served as translator.

  The interrogation, to my surprise, was conducted largely by Kamchak, rather than Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the Tuchuks. Kamchak’s questions were detailed, numerous, complex. He returned to certain questions at various times, in various ways, connecting subtly her responses to one with those of another; he wove a sophisticated net of inquiry about the girl, delicate and fine; I marvelled at his skill; had there been the least inconsistency or even hesitation, as though the girl were attempting to recollect or reconcile the details of a fabrication, it would have been instantly detected.

  During all this time, and torches had been brought, the hours of the night being burned away, Elizabeth Cardwell was not permitted to move, but must needs retain the position of the Pleasure Slave, knees properly placed, back straight, head high, the gleaming chain of the Sirik dangling from the Turian collar, falling to the pelt of the red larl on which she knelt.

  The translation, as you might expect, was a difficult task, but I attempted to convey as much as I could of what the girl, piteously, the words tumbling out, attempted to tell me.

  Although there were risks involved I tried to translate as exactly as I could, letting Miss Cardwell speak as she would, though
her words must often have sounded fantastic to the Tuchuks, for it was largely of a world alien to them that she spoke — a world not of autonomous cities but of huge nations; not of castes and crafts but of global, interlocking industrial complexes; not of barter and tarn disks but of fantastic systems of exchange and credit; a world not of tarns and the tharlarion but of aircraft and motor buses and trucks; a world in which one’s words need not be carried by a lone rider on the swift kaiila but could be sped from one corner of the earth to another by leaping through an artificial moon.

  Kutaituchik and Kamchak, to my pleasure, tended to restrain judgment on these matters; to my gratification they did not seem to regard the girl as mad; I had been afraid, from time to time, that they might, losing patience with what must seem to them to be the most utter nonsense, order her beaten or impaled.

  I did not know then, but Kutaituchik and Kamchak had some reason for supposing that the girl might be speaking the truth.

  What they were most interested in, of course, and what I was most interested in, namely, how and why the girl came to be wandering on the Plains of Turia — in the Lands of the Wagon Peoples — they, and I, did not learn.

  We were all, at last, satisfied that even the girl herself did not know.

  At last Kamchak had finished, and Kutaituchik, too, and they leaned back, looking at the girl.

  “Move no muscle,” I said to her.

  She did not. She was very beautiful.

  Kamchak gestured with his head.

  “You may lower your head,” I said to the girl.

  Piteously, with a rustle of chain, the girl’s head and shoulders fell forward, and though she still knelt, her head touched the pelt of the larl, her shoulders and back shaking, trembling.

  It seemed to me, from what I had learned, that there was no particular reason why Elizabeth Cardwell, and not one of Earth’s countless others, had been selected to wear the message collar. As yet the collar had not been removed and examined. It was perhaps only that she was convenient, and, of course, that she was lovely, thus a fitting bearer of the collar, herself a gift with the message to please the Tuchuks, and perhaps better dispose them toward its contents.